As the United States grapples with an ever-polarized political scene, one topic has been an underlying theme for many candidates on the campaign trail: the importance of youth voting and civic engagement. Maintaining America’s democratic framework warrants engaged civic learning across institutions, particularly given that unlike most political issues, nearly all Americans, regardless of ideology, agree with its necessity. Bolstering civics education across the board, especially in official academic curriculums, must become a priority. Lawrenceville is no exception: including civics education as a core educational obligation would better equip students with the necessary skills and knowledge to effectively participate in the democratic process.
According to the Center for Information & Research on Civic Learning and Engagement (CIRCLE), young people who received high-quality civics education in high school were more likely to vote and be knowledgeable about campaign issues and the U.S. political system. Though civics itself does not necessarily cause higher turnout, as students who experience better civics education could also have access to other advantages in their schools, the strong correlations showcase that active citizens often have received a solid civics education.
In multiple ways, Lawrenceville currently encourages students to engage with civics education on campus. This week, Lawrenceville hosted its inaugural Democracy Day where students participated in a day of civic engagement programming on Election Day instead of following a normal class schedule. Outside of Democracy Day, political clubs such as Left, Right, and Center and The First Amendment also provide avenues for students to explore their political identities and experiment with civic literacy outside of the classroom. Moreover, following the 2020 Presidential election, the School implemented a Pace and Quality of Life (PQL) Day to ensure that community members had sufficient time to reflect and engage in discussions regarding the election results.
But what about civics in the classroom? It’s true that there are course offerings such as Honors Government and A History of American Democracy in Cases, but there is no guarantee that all Lawrentians will take these classes or engage in the aforementioned activities outside of the academic curriculum before they graduate and engage in the electoral process. Naturally, students who are passionate about civics-related issues are more likely to enroll in such courses, while students who might actually need civics education fall further behind. After all, every event during the 2020 PQL Day was optional, and no mandate requires Lawrentians to join political clubs or write opinionated pieces for publications that help cultivate political values. In fact, Lawrentians have the choice to spend their four years without participating in any clubs. It’s completely up to students to decide whether they want to engage in civic education, despite its importance to our society.
One way to directly integrate civics education into the academic curriculum would be to add civics as a core educational obligation alongside community service, the Humanities, and the Personal Development Seminar (PDS) series that students must fulfill during their time at Lawrenceville. As Lawrenceville is a residential community, Third and Second Formers are required to enroll in the PDS program and meet once a week to discuss issues such as sexuality and substance abuse in hopes of guiding underformers to make healthy decisions. A similar program for civics that focuses on the process of voting (voter registration, filling out a ballot, etc.), participation in local governments, dissecting disinformation and fake news during election seasons, can be implemented for all students, especially for the Vth Form class that often consists of students eligible to vote. Alongside initiatives such as Democracy Day, creating this civics requirement could be an additional framework to ensure that students have the time, space, and motivation to prioritize civic participation and understand their role in continuing our democratic republic. Our democracy is too important for us not to prioritize it in the upcoming years, in our actions as well as our learning ethos.
As the only school among its peers in the Eight Schools Association that takes a day off on Election Day, Lawrenceville is certainly heading in the right direction. But as Democracy Day guest speaker Pete Davis emphasized, “Election Day is every day.” Words like democracy and voting are frequently thrown around, but a deeper, action-oriented layer exists that we have the responsibility and privilege to use to make change. There is significant value in continuing the dialogue around Lawrenceville’s civics culture and further developing support systems that could make civics more accessible to all Lawrentians. Lawrenceville is a leader among its peers, and it’s time we take leadership in civics education, too.
Originally published in The Lawrence (Vol. CXLII No. 16) on Nov 11, 2022.
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